Top Essays USB Drive

This USB drive contains 100 of the top This I Believe audio broadcasts of the last ten years, plus some favorites from Edward R. Murrow's radio series of the 1950s. It's perfect for personal or classroom use! Click here to learn more.

I believe in changing your hair color as often as chemically possible.

The very first time I colored my hair I was in the 6th grade. After begging my parents for what at that time seemed like an eternity – playing the responsibility and maturity card numerous times – they finally came to terms with this significant moment in my adolescence, and accompanied me on my first trip to the hair salon. After sitting happily foiled under the dryer for twenty minutes, trying (unsuccessfully) to calm my nerves enough to get past the first pages of Us Weekly, the colorist quietly beckoned me to return to the chair to reveal my new head of hair. I’ll never forget the feeling I had walking out that day – it was as if I was a different person. Confident, mature, and ready for anything. Now don’t get me wrong – looking back at pictures, the hair was a tad, well, bad. Actually it was horrible. It looked as if someone had taken a sponge drenched in beach and rung it over my head. But at the time, it was exactly what I had needed. Change.

Nothing is more invigorating than change. With the power to awaken you, it takes out the dull routine of everyday life, throwing you into a new and exciting environment. I feel that if I stay in the same environment for too long of a time, I become closed to what is really happening around me, oblivious to new opportunities. How easy is it to stay in the safe routine. In fact, nothing frightens me more than becoming stagnant, so set in my ways that I become hesitant of change, fearful of something new unknown. The longest I have ever stayed in one house was two years, and even that felt like a lifetime. Without a new environment, the everyday routine feels tedious and repetitive. And even something as seemingly trivial as a change of hair color can work wonders when you feel bored and stuck in a rut.

And despite all the hair troubles I’ve had over the years – my misguided attempt to dye my then-blonde hair red sticks out in my mind, after which I ended up with a lovely shade of pink – I don’t think I will ever stop jumping head first into change. Perhaps the less romantic, yet certainly more responsible ideal is to make calculated, well thought out moves. But I think that the best decisions are made on whims, before we have time to second guess ourselves and over think our decisions. Maybe I am just a very fickle person, but, to me, nothing is more exciting than not knowing what lies ahead, and nothing is more frightening than not being able to change. Perhaps moving so much has caused me to believe that people should change their environment as often as they like. As Alan Cohen said, “in movement there is life, and in change there is power”. So I believe in switching jobs, moving cross country, or simply dying your hair. Just make sure that it doesn’t fall out.

Essay of the Week

A chance encounter in a coffee shop introduced writer Rachel Richardson to a man who had many stories to tell. Ms. Richardson came to understand that everyone has a story, and our lives can be enriched by listening to the stories of others.Click here to read her essay.